


Amity

by Captain_Clueless



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: (What the hell I'm running with it), Bromanogers? Is that a thing? It should be a thing, Gen, Platonic-Life-Partners Romanogers, bromanogers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-04
Updated: 2017-05-09
Packaged: 2018-09-14 14:45:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9186848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Captain_Clueless/pseuds/Captain_Clueless
Summary: A series of character sketches, focussing on the friendship between Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanoff.Because this friendship is amazing.Title changed because it was insufficiently fancy for AO3. Still 'What Are Friends For' at fanfiction.net, though.





	1. Get Dressed

Sketch 1: Get Dressed

Post-Winter Soldier. 

* * *

 “Get dressed.”

Steve blinks at her. Glances down at his sweatpants and T-shirt – he’d spent the afternoon at the gym, had only just gotten out of the shower – and then glances back at Natasha. She’s still standing there, an eyebrow quirked imperiously, even as her chin is tilted up to speak to him. He’s never noticed before how small she is when not in heeled shoes of some kind. 

“Alright, where are we going?’ he asks with a sigh, letting her into his apartment, and walking into his bedroom. He hears her flicking through some of his books, and shakes his head. Insatiable curiosity – also known as nosiness – is practically in Natasha’s DNA. He shakes away memories of Bucky, pulling him out of reveries or funks with a diversion and a double-date. At least Nat hasn’t gotten to that stage yet. 

“Try the black jeans and the blue button-up,” she calls from his living room.

“You still haven’t answered my question,” he retorts. He obeys her orders anyway, though. He’s learning to do that. Less because you disobey Natasha’s orders at your peril. More because she tries to hide it, but every time he follows her advice, she looks so damn pleased _,_ unguarded and plain _happy_ that he trusted her. Even with something as minor as clothing.

Bottom line: he can’t say ‘no’ to Natasha’s happy-face, alright?

“Karaoke bar,” she says, with the tiniest of tremors in her voice, and he’s glad that she can’t see his face right now.

The first emotion is annoyance. _Seriously, Nat? Karaoke?_

The first thought is _hold on, wait a minute_. 

That tremor. That hesitation, before she spoke. Both of which had to have been deliberate, coming from the greatest spy in the world, a way to let him know about her nervousness. _Oh._

This is something that Natasha loves. It has nothing to do with her Black Widow or any of her other dozen personas. This is something _Natasha_ likes, something that Natasha does, just for the hell of it. Like she's any other thirty-something.

And she wants to share it with him, even though it scares her a little bit. 

She _trusts_ him enough to share something totally silly as karaoke with him.

Huh. Something unambiguously good – at least this one thing –  _did_  come out of the SHIELD/HYDRA FUBAR.

(And maybe Natasha also wants to pull him away from brooding about the frustration of cold leads and dead ends.)

He finishes the buttons, flings open his bedroom door, and smiles down at her. 

“Lead on.” 

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written because I need Steve learning how much it pleases Natasha when he trusts her, Natasha learning how happy it makes Steve when she lets him in, and  _I just have friendship feels about these two, okay?_


	2. Sketch 2: The Bruce Fiasco.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which: Steve teases Natasha, acts as a wingman, and is a shoulder to cry on.

2: Steve is there for her during The Bruce Fiasco. From start to finish. Slight AoU AU. Bromanogers, canonical HulkWidow. 

 

_Part 1: On the Jet_

 

Clint is secured, and as stable as they can get him. Still snarking, which is a good sign. Thor is hovering, unhappily aware of how little he can do for wounds, outside of emergency electrocution. Tony’s at the controls of the jet – for now, anyway. And Bruce is sitting in the corner, recovering and dealing with what Steve guesses to be a truly immense degree of self-loathing.

Natasha frowns, and crosses the room to sit in front of him, taking the headphones off for him. 

Steve raises an eyebrow with interest, and watches the show. 

It’s going reasonably well. Natasha starts with the facts, which is good. Bruce is a scientist, he appreciates facts like “had this not happened, there would have been double casualties” more than he appreciates the fact that watching himself self-flagellate is painful for everyone around him as well as him.  Steve’s chest hurts a bit at the pain he knows underlies Tasha’s question of “How long before you trust me?”

But it’s going reasonably well. As well as can be expected – until she turns to Thor. He knows _why_ she does it, of course. Thor, wielder of Mjolnir, works best as the character endorser. But she’s also forgotten–

“The gates of Hel are filled with the screams of his victims,” Thor says, with a clenched fist, and an approving smile twined into his voice. 

– forgotten that he’s _Thor_ , a guy who can make Steve look pacifistic. 

Bruce buries his head in his hands, and Natasha pins Thor with a death glare. Thor winces; even he is not immune. (Steve doesn’t blame him.)

Thor attempts to dig himself out of the hole (key word: _attempts_ ,) and Steve has to stare at the wall and then the ceiling to hide his smile. 

He doesn’t talk to Tasha about it until she’s in another room, taking off her Widow’s Bites and putting them away.

“So, you and Bruce?”

And Steve watches as the very faintest shades of pink crawl over Natasha’s cheeks. 

“Rogers,” she says, a warning note in her voice.

And if that doesn’t tell him _everything_ , then Steve would be forced to call himself an idiot.

He grins at her, bright, warm, and a little smug. OK, _very_ smug.

“So, what’s your play? And can I be your – what’s that phrase – wingman?” 

Natasha sighs.

“You know, playing matchmaker is supposed to be _my_ thing.”

Steve shrugs and keeps smiling at her. “There’s a saying for that – oh, yeah, I remember now! Payback’s a bitch.” Another modern phrase he’s mastered. 

* * *

_Part 2: At the Party_

Steve hushes Sam next to him, and the man shoots him a quizzical look. 

“Sorry,” Steve whispers, “but the show’s about to start.”

Sam’s eyebrows hike up further on his face.

“What show?” 

Steve glances at the bar, where Bruce is approaching Natasha. He’s never been quite so thankful for serum-enhanced hearing, as he filters out the rest of the party and zeroes in on that conversation.

“You got lousy taste in men, kid,” Bruce says, wryly. 

 _She hasn’t exactly had a lot of chances to develop_ good _taste._

Truth be told, Steve has a few reservations. Bruce has been running for so long, and so has Nat. It could either go very well, or very poorly. He doesn’t think it’ll be anything in between.

Natasha gives a little smile at that. “He’s not so bad. Well, he has a temper. Deep down, he’s all fluff.” She hesitates, and Steve can _see_ her gathering her courage. “Fact is, he’s not like anybody I’ve ever known.”

The bright pink cocktail pauses halfway to Banner’s lips.

“All my friends are fighters,” she elaborates. “And here comes this guy, who spends his life avoiding the fight–” oh good, that’s much more tactful than running away –“because he knows he’ll win.” _And cause a mountain of collateral damage into the bargain, but yes._  

“Sounds amazing,” Bruce murmurs, looking down into his glass. 

“He’s also a huge dork,” Natasha says. Then adding hastily, “Chicks dig that.” 

Steve hops up onto his feet, and murmurs to Sam, “I promise, I’ll recap in a bit,” before crossing the floor to the other end of the bar. 

“So what do you think?” Natasha asks Bruce, as Steve passes one of the couches. “Should I fight this, or run with it?” 

Bruce is hilariously flustered by the question, and Natasha is biting back a grin. 

“Never say never,” she says, turning on her heel, just as Steve leans against the bar. _Showtime, Rogers._  

Steve grins. “It’s nice,” he says to Bruce. 

Bruce stammers, and it’s even more hilarious. Steve suddenly gets a flash of insight into why Natasha tries so hard to matchmake him. A shame for her that he’s only flustered around women he really, really likes. 

“You and Romanoff,” he clarifies. _Not Natasha, or Nat. Don’t give the idea that you’re already close to her like that, or he won’t give it a shot._

“No, we haven’t – that wasn’t–” Bruce keeps stammering, and Steve can’t stop himself from letting out a chuckle.

“It’s OK, nobody’s breaking any bylaws. She’s not the most…open person in the world,” he says. Then smiling, “But with you, she seems very relaxed.”

Bruce is still stammering denials. “No, Natasha, she – she just, she likes to flirt.” 

Steve quirks a brow at that, reaches for a beer. “I’ve seen her flirt. Up close. This ain’t that.” 

Because it’s really not, and OK, Banner hasn’t had the experience of being undercover with Natasha, but it’s _really_ not. It’s a little too honest, a little too awkward, a little too real. And it’s taken all of Natasha’s courage to do that, instead of her usual flirtations.

 Bruce scoffs, and Steve bites back a sigh. _Is he really that obtuse when it comes to life outside the lab?_

 _Nat, he’d better make you happy_.

“Look, as maybe the world’s leading authority on waiting too long? Don’t.” He holds the other man’s gaze, not permitting any lapse of eye contact, so Bruce can get exactly how sincere he is. “You both deserve a win.”

Because they do, honestly, despite his personal reservations, and on a very deep level that Steve knows is probably reserved for schoolgirls, he just wants his team _to be happy_. 

On that note, he starts making his way back to Sam, pretending not to hear when Bruce calls after him,

“What d’you mean, up close?”

And yes, that is _definitely_ jealousy in the other man’s tone.

Steve grins. _Huh. Nat, you might have a chance after all._

* * *

 

 _Part 3:_ _That Conversation. Remixed._

“I’ll double with you,” Natasha says to Steve. “It won’t be the first time.” 

He looks at her, puzzled. “Not with Banner?”

She shakes her head, swallowing hard. His eyes soften, and he sets the shield down, just inside the door of the room that Clint had showed them. 

“Nat.” 

He raises his arms, like he has so many times with the shield in hand, so many times to cover them. She takes the invitation. Her head burrows into his chest, and he rubs at her back. 

“Hey, hey,” he whispers, one hand closing the door. The least he can do for Natasha is offer her some privacy to fall apart. “C’m’re.” 

She makes it as far as the bed, sitting down heavily. They’re both still in their battle gear. He pulls her into his side, offering silent comfort. Natasha’s not the most tactile person, but Steve is, and this is always how he’s comforted emotional girls, and she knows that. She’s not crying, but…he can offer this much, at least. 

He doesn’t ask _you okay?_ because they both know she’s not. 

“I didn’t want to double up with Bruce,” she says, softly. “It’s not fair on him, not when he’s accusing himself of being a monster, for him to have to deal with someone who really is.” 

Steve stiffens. “ _What?”_ He pulls back from the hug a little, looking at her. She refuses to look back.

“Natasha. What did she do to you?”

“Nothing. I – she –”

“Bullshit,” he says. “Natasha. Tell me.” 

This is a conversation between Steve and Natasha, as equals, as friends. However, he’s worried about her, and therefore, he has no qualms with injecting Captain America Command™ into his voice. 

It works again now, and he knows that the only reason it works is because Natasha consents to it working on her. 

“In the Red Room. I was trained there for assassination. Trained so that death didn’t matter to me, it was just a job. Taught to keep my emotions to myself, to form no human attachments. Taught to to kill on orders, without qualms.” She draws in a deep, shuddering breath. “I wasn’t born that way. I was _raised_ that way. And as if unmaking me from the child I once was wasn’t enough…there’s a graduation ceremony. They sterilise you.” 

Steve’s breath catches in his throat; he saw the way Natasha’s eyes lit up, when little Lila Barton asked, _did you bring Auntie Nat?_ Saw the tenderness in the way she picked the child up and set her on her hip. 

“Oh, _Nat_ ,” he whispers, gathering her close, all but pulling her into his lap. She buries her face in his shoulder. 

“Makes everything easier. It’s just more efficient,” she says, her voice wavering. “But making me a monster wasn’t enough. They had to _seal_ it.”

Wanting, and knowing that you could never. Knowing that your agency had been stripped away. The dignity of her choice, forcibly taken from her.

He doesn’t think he’s ever hated the Red Room so much in his life as in that very second. 

He slips off the bed and kneels in front of her, tipping her chin up with a couple of fingers, holding her gaze.

“Natasha. Listen to me,” he says, softly. 

Her gaze tries to slip away, and he readjusts his grip, thumbs under her chin, pointer and middle finger bracing against her cheek so that she has to look at him.

“Yes, you’ve done stuff. You’ve killed people.” And he hates the way she flinches at the words, but if he doesn’t address that, the wound will just fester, and she’ll always think, _if you knew what I’ve done, you’d hate me._  

But he’s read the file, and more importantly, he knows _her_. He knows sweet, dorky Natasha, who match makes, likes karaoke, has a crush on a man who turns into a giant green rage monster, uses emoticons in work texts, and who took down SHIELDRA with him.

“You’ve got red in your ledger. But you’re _not a monster_.” 

Green eyes snap up to meet his, and there’s a flicker of doubt, and hope against hope.

“Y’know why?” he asks her, and she shakes her head.

“Monsters don’t doubt their orders. They don’t choose to take a chance on changing. They don’t keep at the changing when it gets hard. Monsters don’t fight for their redemption.” 

Surprise, now, joining doubt, and the _maybe, just maybe_ written in large print on her face. If you know Nat, that is.

He squeezes her hands. “You’re not a monster. You’re my friend,” he says, before standing. “Do you want the first shower, or will I take it?” 

She smiles at him, a little tentatively, then rises, and gives him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Thanks. I’ll take the shower.” 

He nods, and then drops down on the bed, as she collects her toiletries. 

* * *

4: _After Bruce Leaves_

He’s exhausted from the fight, and covered in seven layers of grime. When he finds his old room on the Helicarrier, he just wants to grab a towel, hit the showers, and then sleep for eight hours. He doesn’t usually need that much, but it’s a special treat. A _yay-we-saved-the-world-again_ treat, as Tony might put it. And he should probably eat, at some point, too, from the way his stomach’s been growling, but he’s so _tired_.

He’s a little surprised when he sees a flash of red curls, Widow’s Bites and a black cat-suited form curled up on his bed.

“Nat? What’s…?”

Because he’s really not on his game. He’s starving, dirty, exhausted, and crashing hard from the adrenaline rush that had carried him through the past few days. Natasha should be cuddled up with Bruce somewhere.

“He left,” she says, into his pillow. “He left, and this is such a cliché, and I feel more like a schoolgirl than Black Widow. And it hurts, Rogers. He _left_.” 

Steve lets his head thump against his door with a sigh. 

 _I’m going to kill Banner,_ he decides. _Hulked out or no._  

“Where’s Barton?” he asks, letting his eyes close briefly. 

“With Maximoff,” she says. “I told him to go to her. Kid’s going to need somebody.” 

Steve’s heart twists a bit of that, in sympathy and in remembrance of his own brother. _Bucky._

“Yeah, she is,” he says, coming to sit beside her on the bed. He rubs at her back, and he feels a tremor down her spine. “Y’know, it’s OK to not be Widow around me.”

“You’re still Cap,” she says, with a little chuckle. “Still the Team Dad, otherwise I wouldn’t have come. I feel like both of us should stay in persona.” 

He shakes his head. “I’m not Cap right now, and you know it. I just haven’t gotten out of the suit yet. You came because I’m _Steve,_ and you’re Natasha. And we’re friends. Friends are there for each other when their hearts get–” he avoids the word ‘broken’, because honestly, he’s not sure that Bruce and Natasha ever got that far, but– “bruised,” he finishes.

He stands. Because yes, friends are there for each other, and part of that is not letting each other wallow. “C’mon. Go get your things, hit the showers, I’ll meet you in the cafeteria.”

“Why?” the question is petulant. He sighs, and rolls his eyes. 

“Because you’re _Natasha Romanoff_ ,” he says, as if it’s obvious. “And you’ve never let the bastards get you down. You gonna start now?”

At that, she uncurls from her foetal position.

“Give me fifteen minutes. I’ll see you there.” 

And he knows that later that night, she’ll wake him up from nightmares and talk him down from his martyr complex, and he’ll either a) hold her if she wants to cry about Bruce – which isn't that likely, but hey, you never know, he was just on a city that _flew –_  or b) – much more likely – volunteer if she needs to hit something. 

Because what else are friends for?


	3. Sketch 3: The One Where Natasha Hates Feelings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Title: The One Where Natasha Hates Feelings
> 
> Also known as: Steve thinks they should talk about feelings, before Natasha makes someone cry again. Natasha begs to differ.
> 
> Beginning immediately after the last part of ‘The Bruce Fiasco’, but before the New Avengers line-up in Age of Ultron.

By mutual agreement, after the showers and dinner in the Commissary, they return to his quarters. The bed’s big enough for the both of them, certainly bigger than Sam’s guest bedroom.

Natasha’s back is settled against his, and despite his exhaustion, his eyes are still open. And all he can see and hear and feel for a while is the suppressed terror of the city flying, the terror of catching the woman that Thor tossed up to him while he was dangling off the precipice, the children screaming, the buildings ablaze, the smell of sulphur…

“Steve. Steve, it’s me.”

Natasha’s voice is low and calm.

She’s kneeling at the bedside, trying to lock eyes with him, her small, cool hands cupping his cheeks gently. It’s disrupting the flow of images, making it a bit harder to see the blood pouring down one child’s face. Poor kid, it really had just been the wrong place, the wrong time…

“Steve. It’s Natasha. We’re in your quarters on the helicarrier.”

He clears his throat. “I know.” Forces himself to make eye contact with her, their faces lit by the SHIELD night-lights. “It’s not a flashback, or an episode. I’m not reliving it.” 

Her eyes soften. “But you’re remembering it.”

He nods.

She sighs, and braces her hands on one of his shoulders and vaults over him to land on the mattress other side of the mattress, before rolling over until she’s spooning him. Her leg is thrown over his hip.

“Showoff,” he mumbles. There’s no heat in it.

“It wasn’t your fault, Steve,” she murmurs, refusing to be sidetracked. She wraps an arm around his chest, and one of his hands come up to squeeze it, accepting the offered comfort. “It wasn’t. You did everything you possibly could have.”

“Not enough,” he says, with a sigh. “Still so much death.” 

She hums at that, not agreement, just acknowledgement: _I know. I get it. I’m here._

And with the feel of her breathing beside him, Steve manages to fall into sleep. The final sensation he registers before exhaustion – emotional and physical alike – claims him is: _safe_.

* * *

The first interruption, it’s her. She’s awake and gasping, and he rolls onto one elbow, looking at her with concern.

“Nightmare?”

She shakes her head. “Memory. Red Room.” 

His lips purse. He waits for her to talk. 

She avoids his gaze.

Steve stifles a sigh.

She closes her eyes again, and waits for his full weight to settle back onto the mattress beside her.

* * *

The next time, it’s him. He wakes up, and for a moment, all he can see is Times Square when he woke up, all he can feel is the aching realisation that _they’re all gone_ , that the life he should have had is _gone, gone, gone_.

He takes a deep breath to steady himself, wiping at his eyes. 

Natasha snuggles in a bit tighter to him, aware, even in her sleep.

And it doesn’t make the ache go away, not at all, really. But at least he has the reminder that, strange and broken and dysfunctional though it be, he has a new family and a new life here. He’ll never get back what should have been.

So he’ll just have to deal with what _is_ , he thinks with a sigh. He rolls over, wraps an arm around Natasha’s waist, and draws her close, so that she – his friend, his teammate, his _family_  – is anchoring him to the present.

It’s time to live again. 

* * *

Natasha glares at the agent. He cringes, his lip trembling. Natasha’s glare does not decrease in ferocity one little bit. 

Steve sighs. At least this one doesn’t look like he’s going to piss himself, unlike the first three. Serum-enhanced senses had their downside, honestly. 

But he has _had enough_ with Natasha choosing to cope by making baby Agents cry and piss themselves. So he scoops her up, one hand at her knees, one hand under her back.

“Rogers,” she says, her tone absolutely calm and cool. The way it is when she is absolutely _livid_ with you. 

“Romanov, you keep making the baby agents cry and pee themselves, and the Avengers’ public image will never recover,” he tells her solemnly. He thinks a prayer of thanks that they’re not far from the gym room/sparring arena. 

He gets that Natasha needs to take her frustration out on something. He really does. In fact, he’ll happily volunteer for the task. 

But it really _wasn’t_ Baby Agent #4’s fault that there was no information on Bruce.

Just like it wasn’t Baby Agent #3’s fault that she’d left a clean pair of clothes back in her room, and therefore had run into Natasha whilst she was wearing a T-shirt that proclaimed HULK SMASH on her way back from her workout.

Or Baby Agent #2’s fault that her boyfriend had said yes to her on the week-end and was now her fiancé.

Or Baby Agent #1’s fault that, due to a kitchen mix-up, mac ’n’ cheese was the order of the day at the commissary for breakfast. Mac ’n’ cheese which just so happened to be Bruce’s favourite junk food.

By this point, Steve is pretty sure that it's his presence alone that has kept Natasha from committing actual bodily harm.

“They deserve it,” Natasha says firmly, still in that calm tone.

“No, they don’t,” he sighs, kicking the door to the gym room open. “Everyone, clear out. Widow and I need the room,” he orders to the few pairs still in there. By now, most people have finished their morning workouts, and it’s just a few of the lunchtime regulars. Out of the suit or no, his tone of command is still good enough that the few pairs immediately desist, grab their towels and their gear, and leave the room. He sets Natasha down, and she glares up at him. 

“Tell you what, though,” he says, gently, “I will offer myself as your punching bag for the next hour. Then, if you wanna talk about what’s bothering you – if only for the sake of _not_ overloading the laundry facilities on the helicarrier – we talk. Deal?”

He sets her down, and she nods at him. “Deal.”

And then she’s leaping on him, and there’s no more time for thinking or strategising about how to play this.

The no-holds-barred sparring session – he’d originally been intending to play meek and helpless, but one glare from Natasha when he went limp after she put him in a hammerlock put paid to that – lasts precisely sixty minutes, and by the end, they have both sweated through their gear. He has gained a few more bruises, a stunning black eye, and a bloodied nose, whilst Natasha has a bruise on her cheekbone, a bloodied lip, and is favouring her right knee a little. He has a suspicion that he’d bruised a couple of her ribs as well. 

“You gonna need a medic for that?” he asks. 

She grimaced. “The knee might need checking on. The rest will be fine.”

He nods, and in that moment, he’s so, _so_ unbelievably thankful for the fact that the grapevine has already made it clear that Cap and Widow have taken over the sparring arena indefinitely.

Because Steve Rogers is about to go into uncharted territory.

He is about to broach a conversation with a girl – woman, dame, whatever – about _feelings_. And despite his having had excellent coaching from the USO girls in a curriculum best summarised as, “Becoming a Brother to Many, Many Sisters”, _initiating_ said conversations was not part of that curriculum.

“So.” He cleared his throat. “Talk?”

She gave a short, bitter laugh. “What’s there to say? He left. I took a chance, opened up, it seemed like it was going well, and then he left.” She shook her head. “Great talk. We should do it again sometime, by which I mean ‘never.’”

Steve sighs, and decides _what the hell, it’s not like she can become more furious with me. Or, for that matter, with guys in general right now_. “I’m pretty sure it was a case of Banner’s self-sacrificing, noble streak coming out at the wrong time, rather than him just upping and leaving you,” he said. 

Natasha takes a knife out of her belt and starts playing with it. “If he wanted me to be happy, then he should have stayed.”

There’s really nothing that Steve can say to that. 

So instead, he cracks his knuckles, and says, “Hey, wanna test how fast I can dodge your knives?”

Deep and meaningful attempt has failed. He’ll just have to stick to her side for a few days, and distract the hell out of her.

Natasha’s grin is both sharklike and knowing, telling him that she knows exactly what he’s up to, but she approves. It’s more terrifying than the Chitauri invasion and the Red Skull combined. 

“Let’s.”

_The things I do for my teammates,_ he thinks, before he throws himself to the side and into a crouch to dodge the first thrown knife.

* * *

Because it is totally within Steve's character to try and talk to someone else about their feelings that are eating them up (all the while ignoring his own issues), but he doesn't try that with Natasha, at the end of AoU. Leading me to suspect he tried that play, it failed miserably, and he decided on distraction instead. Hence the birth of this ficlet.

 


	4. Sketch 4: Cosmetics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha has a broken arm. Steve comes to her rescue...just not how you're thinking.  
>  Set post-Age of Ultron, while they're training the New Avengers.

Sketch 4: Cosmetic

“Should you really be doing an undercover op?” Steve asked her, as she fumbled with the lipstick. “I mean,” he continued, looking at her array of make-up. It was impressive, by nearly anybody’s standard. “Your right arm is still in a sling.”

“Exactly,” she said, blowing a lock out of hair out of her face with a huff. “I need some fun. To blow off some steam. Nick knows that, that’s why he offered the op to me.”

“True enough,” he conceded, before snatching the lipstick out of her hand.

“Hey!” she said, trying to grab at it with her good arm.

“Natasha,” he said, setting it down, putting his hands on her shoulders. Locking eyes with her. “Please. Let me help.”

One copper eyebrow rose. “Captain America can do a girl’s make-up?”

“Captain America is an icon of 1940s masculinity and would never do such a thing. Steve Rogers spent a year on tour with a bunch of chorus girls and often helped them get ready for the show.”

She winced. “Point taken. Sorry.”

He shrugged. “No problem. Just…please. Let me help.”

Slowly, she nodded. He uncapped the lipstick, and she opened her mouth.

It came back easily. Start at the top centre, work your way right, then work your way left. A few careful swipes along the bottom lip, and Natasha’s mouth was a dark pink colour that brought out a very attractive shade of pink on her cheeks. No blush required, then.

“Eyeliner?” he asked her, his hand finding the tube of liquid liner. She nodded, holding her chin steady. He dipped the wand in, and started lining the upper lids.

Footsteps echoed along the corridor, and Steve sighed. A moment later, Sam threw open the door.

“Hey, Natasha, I was just–” he stopped mid-sentence.

“Hey, Sam,” Natasha said, not moving an inch.

Steve glanced at Sam out of the corner of his eye. His mouth was opening and closing, over and over again.

“She can’t do her make-up with a broken arm,” Steve said.

“Ohh,” Sam nodded. “Right. And you can do a girl’s eyeliner?”

“Mmhm,” he nodded, carefully finishing the line before he moved onto the next eye. “Next question.”

“Uh–” there was a faint movement of air. Shaking his head to clear it, probably. “I was wondering if Nat wanted dinner before she left.”

Steve lifted the wand for Natasha to speak without the eyeliner being smudged. “Thank you, but it will look suspicious if I don’t eat at the op. It’s a shindig. Dinner, dancing, the works.”

Steve cocked an eyebrow at her. “And it won’t look strange if you show up alone?”

Sam nodded, thoughtful. “No-one’s going to believe you going stag.”

She sighed. “It will, but that can’t be helped.”

“I beg to differ,” Steve said, finishing her lid. “What’s the dress code?”

“Cocktail,” she replied. Ah. He should have guessed.

“Give me ten minutes to shower and find my cufflinks,” he said. “Wilson, can you do her mascara?”

“No, I can’t do mascara,” Sam said, sounding a touch exasperated.

“Alright, maybe fifteen then,” Steve said, reaching for the mascara tube.

Natasha rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. “Thank you.”

He smiled down at her, withdrawing the wand. “You’re welcome.”


	5. Sketch 5: Grand Theft Auto

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it feels a bit stilted, but what the hell. Hope you guys like it.

Sketch 5: “In times of stress, Steve has a tendency to steal VWs.”

She found him three miles down the road, his hands clenched so tightly around the steering wheel that his knuckles were white.

She yanked the door open and dropped into the passenger seat.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

She glanced at him. He looked like a rubber band one stretch away from snapping. “Gotta say, Rogers, you picked an interesting coping mechanism,” she said lightly.

“Like you can talk,” he griped. “You like making baby agents cry. You would have been perfect for the job.”

Ah. That did explain it. Steve was impervious to things like people seeing him only good for menial work by way of sheer bloody-mindedness. But he wasn’t good at being not-nice, when dealing with people in general. And that was, well, what the job required h She was never sure if it was the whole Captain America thing or the whole Steve Rogers thing.

She patted him on the shoulder, and he leaned into the touch.

“Do you want me to take it over?” It’d make the op a  _lot_ more difficult to carry off, which Steve knew. Still. Besides, she was beginning to get bored with winding Coulson up.

He gave a tired snicker. “Nah, I’ll do it. Captain America, defeated by an internship position that has him doing Starbucks runs and planting hard drives? I’d never hear the end of it from Stark.”

Natasha considered this, and nodded. “Point. You wanna return the car to the owner, or shall I?”

Steve looked mildly abashed, peering out from under absurdly long lashes. She raised an eyebrow. _Rogers, if you think you can just bat your eyes at me, think again._

“I’m sorry. It was just so…”

“The car was right there, and you wanted _out_. I get it.” She patted him on the shoulder again. “Answer the question.”

“I’ll do it,” he sighed. “Maybe it’ll bring the op to a faster conclusion.”

She kissed him on the cheek. “Good luck, Steve.”

She got out of the car.

 _I'm never letting him tease me about my coping mechanisms again_ , she thought.


End file.
